almotamar.net - The World Trade Organization formally accepted on Wednesday Yemen as a new WTO member and its “accession” to the WTO.

At a ceremony to celebrate the decision, WTO director-general Roberto Azevêdo congratulated the Yemen government for the domestic reforms it is undertaking after 13 years to finally become a WTO member.

“We celebrate accessions both because of what it means for the individual country, but also because of what it means for this organization,” he said

Yemen will be the 35th least developed country in the WTO.

“This group makes up a fifth of the whole WTO membership. It is an important constituency — and, as we have seen in recent days, it is one that is increasingly making its voice heard,” said the Director-General.

“Sometimes things change for countries and fortunes change. But the very essence of a country and the history and the civilisation remains. Ours has been trading for the last at least five or six hundred years, in fact, since the spice route," he told the assembled ministers from the WTO’s current membership.

“We aim to take back that road again and to connect with everybody in the world. ... I hope that after a few months, we will have a new Yemen born."

The Yemeni Parliament will have six months, until 2 June 2014, to ratify its accession package. It will then inform the WTO and 30 days later it will officially become a member.

A Saudi aggression fighter jet targeted a citizen's car driving in Fara area of Kutaf district in Saada province overnight, killing the driver and injuring his friend, a security official said on Monday.

Scores of Saudi enemy soldiers were killed and injured on Sunday when the army and popular forces repelled a Saudi military attempt to sneak into Shurfah site in the border province of Najran, a military official said.

Saudi aggression warplanes have launched more than 49 airstrikes over the past hours on several residential areas across Yemen, a security official said on Sunday.
The airstrikes targeted the areas of Malahiz and Husama in Dhahir district, and areas Thuban, Masahif and Sdad in Bakim district of northern Saada province.